The Corporate Wellness Advisor reports that only 45% of US workers feel satisfied with their jobs, down from 52% in 2005 and 61% in 1987. With the highest unemployment rates in a half-century, you’d think the numbers would be going in the opposite direction – people should just be happy they have a job, right? But it’s not quite that simple. Feeling thankful for employment is not the same thing as feeling satisfied with your work environment and feeling engaged in your work. It’s worthwhile for employers and business owners to regularly assess their work climate, because employee state of mind, happiness, health, and engagement have an enormous impact on productivity and healthcare costs. Since every business is a people business, it pays to improve employee morale and motivation. Creating a positive work climate that encourages just one $75K/year employee to remain loyal to your company for ten years can save you over $675K in turnover costs. It pays big dividends to have an effective employee retention strategy. How do you improve retention? Businesses are wise to regularly explore two avenues to ensure their work environment isn’t squashing people or profits. First, do regular non-attribution work climate surveys to uncover latent personality or work environment difficulties that might be causing stress or lowering productivity. Owners often discover problems they’d otherwise never hear about by giving employees the chance to answer an anonymous survey. People are reluctant to talk to the boss about workplace difficulties, so it’s likely you won’t hear about them until they’re already a problem – unless you ask for anonymous feedback. Second, be sure your benefits package is up to date and competitive. Everyone offers a solid insurance and EAP plan; you need to go a step beyond in today’s environment to keep your employment costs down while keeping employee motivation high. Consider a vacation wellness plan to help keep your employees healthy, happy, loyal, and low-stress. Your staff and your bottom line will both thank you for the effort! We’ve recently done some in-depth analysis of the factors that influence employee turnover, and its cost to businesses. Learn what you might be spending to replace departing employees, and discover how you might influence them to stay on your team – we’ve summarized our research in a short but informative white paper. We hope you find the information useful and ... Read More

If you’ve spent any time trying to decipher the new healthcare legislation provisions, you’ve probably noticed that it’s difficult to distill meaningful information from the sea of verbiage. The Huffington Post has done a good job of boiling it down (see their article), but the information takes a few too many clicks to uncover (patience is a virtue, just not one of ours), so we’ve boiled it down even further here. And added our own two cents, of course. Everybody’s a critic. Without further ado: No more “sick slashing.” Your insurance company can’t drop your coverage over a technicality if you become seriously ill. Children with existing health conditions are now universally eligible for coverage. Adults in the same boat will have to wait until 2014 for the coverage inclusion measure to include them. Adults with pre-existing conditions will be included in a temporary high risk pool, which will be phased out via exchanges in 2014 (when the exclusion ban takes full effect). The “donut hole” in Medicare drug coverage for seniors will be 50% filled by next year. Children are eligible for parental plan coverage through age 26. Insurance caps will be limited through 2014, when they will be banned altogether. New plans must accommodate preventative care. All plans will have to accommodate preventive measures by 2018. Insurance companies have to reveal overhead expenditures (the public will see the man behind the curtain – the entire law is contentious, but we predict the greatest compliance resistance will surround this measure). Randomly, indoor tanning services will now be taxed. (We’re sure it sounded like a good idea at the time…) LOOPHOLE ALERT: the law allows for new fraud and waste screening procedures. Insurance companies are already notorious for their unnavigable applications – we predict this measure will cause consternation as the details of its implementation flesh out. Rural areas will enjoy Medicare payment protections. Blue Cross organizations must maintain a medical loss ratio of 85% or higher in order to receive tax benefits. Restaurants will have to publish nutritional information. The law closes a “coverage gap” for early retires (55-64), who often experience high coverage costs. The government plans to make a website available with coverage options summaries for each state. The intent is to facilitate consumer education. Therapy researchers can tap into a temporary $1B grant designed to facilitate disease treatment breakthroughs. New plans must implement an approved appeals process for coverage and claims disputes. Businesses with fewer than 50 employees will get tax credits covering up to 50% of employee premiums. We see this as a significant impetus for small businesses to stay small, given that current healthcare measures cost an average of $13,000 per year already. There you have it. Opinions outnumber experts, but there’s one thing we all agree on: it’s going to cost time and treasure like never before to implement the measures as written. We put together a white paper with some ideas for how to reduce your healthcare expenses moving forward. We hope it’s helpful. Just like you, we’re watching carefully as the law’s implementation unfolds. It’s going to be ... Read More

Too many of us in the executive suite have bought into the notion that better processes, smoother systems, and smarter number crunching can propel business growth. They usually can’t. Chasing efficiency is usually the hallmark of a shortsighted executive, swiping at the low-hanging fruit of business growth and employee productivity. Don’t get me wrong – technological and process-enhancing tools are certainly indispensable for rectifying inefficiencies and identifying misaligned efforts, which are necessary preconditions for profit in any economic environment. But your leadership efforts can’t stop there. Long-term growth, profit, and productivity ultimately hinge on messy, organic, seemingly random, human activities. People innovate, produce, inspire, grow, win market share, and add value to the marketplace. Your business’ degree of employee productivity, engagement, pride, and motivation will determine your profits down the stretch. Customers take process efficiency, data fidelity, responsiveness, and service for granted – you must do those things right, or you don’t stand a chance. But thriving in business takes inspiration, which is a uniquely human and decidedly non-institutional attribute. Compare Dell to Apple. While both are obviously successful technology companies, Apple’s level of continuous, market-defining inspiration sets them an order of magnitude apart. The rest of the computer, music, and telecommunications worlds spend years catching up to Apple’s endless stream of innovations. It’s not an accident. Apple’s employment policies, compensation, employee benefits, workplace norms, and company culture are all carefully crafted to support a strategic investment in their most critical business asset: the emotional, unpredictable, variable, perfectly non-systemic humans that power their world domination. Are ... Read More

I had a ham and cheese omelet the other day. I thought about that old joke – the cow and the chicken were involved in making my omelet, but the pig was committed. If you’ll indulge a bit of a low-brow analogy, it struck me that executives and business owners have much more in common with the pig than the chicken. We’re married to our business outcomes, and personally committed to our results. The same isn’t always true of our employees, which gives rise to what I call the “Pride Gap.” While everyone clearly has a vested interest in company success, there’s often a big difference between owners/executives and employees from a passion, commitment, inspiration, and motivation perspective. It’s natural for business owners to take great pride in our work; it’s less common to find employees who do the same. The difference is the “Pride Gap.” I believe that an executive team’s ability to bridge that gap is the best predictor of long-term success in any market. Bridging the “Pride Gap” is one of the fundamental employee productivity and business profit challenges. Motivated, committed, inspired employees clearly produce more, stay with your company longer, and generate better business results. You’d fill your staff with them, if that were possible, but employee motivation and productivity fall under a normal distribution just like all other human attributes. You can’t turn everyone into a model employee, but you can raise the average substantially. How? Inspire. Lead. Care. Motivate. Not by extolling the virtues of your product, service, workplace, etc – though some of that is necessary, it certainly can’t be the cornerstone of your leadership stance. Some people will be passionate widget makers. Most won’t. Bridging the “Pride Gap” – inspiring your employees to extend, stretch, innovate, and produce as passionate widget makers – only begins when you demonstrate your passion for their lives and wellbeing. There aren’t any leadership shortcuts, and you can’t fake it (they’ll know). If you don’t care about them, they won’t care about you, and they certainly won’t care about your business. There’s an aloof formality that has come to replace the atmosphere of genuine teamwork in many businesses, and while it might be politically correct and contain all of the proper HR-approved terminology, its sterility and distance sap the life from your business. Its effect is precisely the opposite from its intent – bland generalization and neurotic attempts at total non-offense dehumanize the workplace. Too little passion causes too little profit. I’m not advocating inappropriate workplace behavior, and I’m well aware of the problem of the very small number of opportunistic malcontents who might eagerly take advantage of a slip-up. Protect yourself by being professional, and comply with standards. But you have to show that you care about the messy, entangled, encumbered, and complicated humanness that we all bring to work with us. How, specifically? When you truly care, you’ll instantly and magically know how to make a difference for your staff on a daily basis, in a way that is uniquely your own as well as uniquely meaningful to the people who work for you. It’s as if the universe rallies to help you make your employees’ work life better. If you demonstrate tangibly and consistently that you care about your employees, your employees will come to care about you. And when they do, they will naturally begin to care about the things you care about. Profit, productivity, innovation, efficiency, market share, and customer loyalty will all follow. That’s the only way I know to bridge the “Pride ... Read More

The Phoenix Business Journal recently honored Zoescent partner Steve Pieper as a 2010 Forty Under 40 award winner. Steve was selected from a field of over 200 exceptionally qualified nominees, and joins an elite group of Phoenix area executives, entrepreneurs, and business leaders recognized both for their past accomplishments and their future potential. Steve brings a deep executive experience to Zoescent. He is a 1994 Distinguished Graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy, a Hertz Fellow, a decorated combat aviator, and a proven leader in a wide variety of ... Read More

Our recent retention focus has revealed some interesting statistics. For instance, a 100-employee project management firm with $98K average annual employee salary and benefits package outlay, and a 14% annual turnover rate – the industry average – spends over $4.1 million every year replacing employees lost to voluntary turnover. As we’ve mentioned in other posts, your benefits package plays a monstrous role in the retention equation. Implementing an employee wellness program attractive enough to convince just 1/5 of the employees who would otherwise have left the firm to remain on staff would save the company in this example around $800K the first year. That’s an impressive first-year cost reduction, but the savings actually increase in the out-years. Keeping one employee happy enough to remain on staff for ten years can circumvent more than five turnover cycles. As the Sasha Corporation notes, the value of keeping an employee is far greater than the cost of replacing one. This revelation has helped business owners take a more long-term view of their benefits package. See some of their results here. We’ve also compiled our research into a white paper. It’s a quick read, but the numbers might surprise you. Take a look ... Read More

Stress in the workplace has long been linked with adverse health consequences, and one could spend a lifetime or two reading studies that explore stress’ harmful consequences. But that doesn’t mean that businesses have done much about it. Employers have added enough work hours over the past 25 years to fill a 13th work month, and most employees are electronically connected to work while they’re at home as well. It’s getting harder and harder to truly walk away from work to relax and unwind, and employees are suffering from the effects of stress as a consequence. A Cure for Burnout Careerbuilder.com recently released the results of a survey revealing that 77% of employees feel burned out on their jobs. An unrealistic workload, tight deadlines, last-minute projects, and stressful interpersonal relationships at work contributed to stress levels. We’ve done a ton of research on the subject (which we’ve put together for you in a white paper), and it turns out that unmanaged stress in the workplace leads directly to significant business losses. I don’t think anyone would contend that a burned-out employee is likely to be performing at optimum levels, and it’s encouraging that many employers are at least becoming sufficiently aware of the problem to begin considering meaningful action. But it might be time to take the next step. Consider adding a Vacation Wellness™ program to your employee wellness and benefit suite. Destination vacations are a great way for staff to reduce stress, and your business will benefit from a rejuvenated workforce. Some stress is necessary for peak performance, but most workplaces are already past the point of diminishing returns. Is yours among ... Read More

Quite a lot, as it turns out. A few kind folks have done all of the grueling number crunching, and there’s only one conclusion to draw: if you don’t yet have a wellness program in place for your business or department, you’re probably burning cash by the bushel. To wit: a 38 month case study of 23,000 participants in Citibank, N.A.’s health management program showed that within a 2 year period, Citibank realized a ROI between $4.56 and $4.73 per dollar invested in their various wellness initiatives. One study of 72 wellness program articles concluded that health promotion programs achieve an average ROI of $3.48 when considering health care costs alone, $5.82 per $1 when examining absenteeism, and $4.30 when both outcomes are considered. That means your balance sheet can start to get well on wellness. And it doesn’t have to cost a fortune. One of the easiest and most cost-effective methods to achieve meaningful heart disease risk reduction comes from a surprising source: vacation time off. Men who vacation are at 32% lower heart attack risk, and women vacationers are 53% less at-risk, according to the Framingham study results. Regular vacationers suffer far less from the adverse effects of workplace stress, produce more, miss less work, and file far fewer and less costly health claims. It’s a no-brainer. And if you want to ensure that your folks actually get away during their time off, make a vacation health enhancement benefit available. A Vacation Wellness™ program encourages your staff to plan trips to killer destinations by taking care of all the details while offering deep discounts on total trip prices. It’s an affordable way to add big impact to your wellness offering. We’ve done a ton of research on the subject of wellness in the workplace, and many of the results are counterintuitive and surprising. We’ve put them all together in a white paper. We hope it helps you make a bit more sense of the workplace wellness maze, and we hope you find the information useful and helpful. Some of the most important things are also the simplest. We’re happy to report that an effective wellness offering falls in that category! Wellness has never been ... Read More

You’ll probably be as surprised as we were. We recently accomplished some hardcore employee retention research (and learned quite a few surprising tidbits we’ll share in an upcoming white paper), and discovered that employee benefits packages have equal weight as pay when it comes to staff retention and motivation. That certainly got our attention. Most of us aren’t thinking much beyond surviving the recession, but it’s probably the perfect time to take a strategic look at your employee benefit plan. If it doesn’t include a wellness benefit, it probably should – salary.com notes that of the employees who view their wellness plans favorably, 64% plan to remain with their employer for five years or more. Employees who don’t like their company’s employee wellness benefits are four times more likely to find a job elsewhere. And if you’re looking at wellness benefits, it pays to get the most return on your employee benefit dollar. Most workplace wellness programs focus on hypertension, weight, smoking, and lack of exercise – all beneficial health pursuits, but not the costliest conditions from a business standpoint (they all add under 21% to your healthcare costs – real money, but not the biggest cost burdens in the wellness sphere). Stress and depression can add 46% and 70%, respectively, to your healthcare bill. Some estimates place the cost impact of stress and depression at 147%. Ouch. Clearly we’re biased, but we think that Vacation Wellness™ does a great job targeting stress and depression. Employees who vacation regularly are two to three times less likely to suffer from depression than their counterparts. A Duke Occupational Mental Health report cites the benefits of using physical distance, variance of activity, and reconnecting with family – all destination vacation staples – to reduce workplace stress and prevent burnout. Benefits count. It’s best to make sure your benefit plan resonates with your staff, and among the most powerful ways to do that is to invest in a meaningful wellness ... Read More

They wouldn’t be alone. Salary.com reports that while most employers think around 1/3 of their staff might be searching on the sly for another job, the truth is that close to 2/3 of your workforce is probably looking for a better offer. When you consider that replacing key staff can cost upwards of 300% of their positoin’s annual salary and benefits total, employee retention becomes a much higher priority. In fact, US businesses experience 14.7% voluntary turnover every year. Depending on your industry, average employee salary, and time to replace key staff, turnover can add up to 46% more to your total employment costs every year. What factors influence turnover? Numerous intangibles, of course, such as the level of draconian tyranny your managers use to enforce company policies, but there’s quite a bit the average company can do to mitigate voluntary turnover – even (especially!) during a recession. A terrific place to start is with your employee wellness package. We discovered that if employees don’t find your wellness program attractive, they’re four times more likely to leave your company for greener pastures. A Vacation Wellness™ program is an easy way to spice up your employee wellness offering. At a recent Vacation Wellness™ benefit program rollout, employees were literally jumping up and down with excitement over their new vacation benefit program. The business owner was still fielding thankful comments from staff members two weeks later. That’s certainly a warm wellness reception. Having excited employees is worth far more than just a warm feeling. Right Management and the World Economic Forum report that 64% of employees who take a favorable view of your wellness offering plan to remain with your company for more than five years. Depending on your market segment, keeping a single $75K/year employee on staff for five years can save two replacement cycles, and up to $600K in replacement costs. For a single employee. Those figures mean that few employee initiatives can save you as much money over time as a focused retention strategy. It’s best to keep your own pastures green. We’ve just released the results of our employee retention study review in a white paper. You might be surprised what you learn about how much employee turnover is costing your business. Take a look ... Read More